


Rebirth

by skelli



Category: Fate/Zero, Fate/stay night & Related Fandoms, Fate/stay night: Unlimited Blade Works (Anime 2014)
Genre: Canon compliant spoilers, M/M, Penetrative Sex, a sort of nihilistic angle
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-28
Updated: 2017-08-28
Packaged: 2018-12-21 00:01:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,767
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11932092
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/skelli/pseuds/skelli
Summary: The birth of a partnership that altered the very momentum of Kotomine Kirei's life. By his own fate, he found himself enraptured with blood red eyes that reminded him of suffering.A piece that delves into the development of Kotomine's relationship with the servant Gilgamesh.





	Rebirth

**Author's Note:**

> One of my favorite relationships among one of I think the most well rewritten pieces of work I've seen happen. This deals with Kotomine Kirei's relationship with Gilgamesh over the course of Fate/Zero into Fate Unlimited Blade Works with a hint of Fate Stay Night because at the end of it all, we wouldn't be here without it. 
> 
> I want to say beforehand that there is a bit of deconstruction of Christianity within the fic if I could even call it that but for the sake of anyone who doesn't feel they want to read the questioning of religion, this might not be the fic to read. 
> 
> I welcome comments. Thanks for clicking on my work.

His self-righteous stance upon worldly pleasures was merely a façade driven and maintained by his priesthood and the truth itself, coiled deep within him around the emptiness that was his own acknowledged desire. The role of a priest was well suited by his ironic lack of spiritual sin and thus he continued the position without problem. Self-righteousness was preserved simply because he had never once found himself compelled to break free of logical, cool manipulation to take something for himself. This truth was he lacked the need to hunger for anything the physical or spiritual realms had to offer him. He could take life, but Kotomine Kirei could not find it in himself.

The grail itself was a mystery to him. He questioned its possibly divine and unyielding ability to choose and its choice of him but it didn’t prevent him from playing his pieces on the board motivated solely by the prospect of new experience. He could manipulate the pieces as he wished without attachment and that was why he could never really lose. He had nothing to lose. But there was promise in the game, promise of a rebirth of sorts for him. He didn’t need the grail to find himself standing before the edge of what could be something, he just needed the game.

He thought possibly the man, Emiya Kiritsugu, could be his savior. In a twisted way, he felt they were connected by the depths of their emptiness. They were similar, they were cynical chaos, bound in flesh and capable of taking from others without any sacrifice to their own person. He wondered if he could connect to Emiya, could he find what he didn’t know he wanted? If he could kill Emiya, would that open a new realm of humanity for him? Not that humanity was what he was looking for. Conquering humanity, conquering the pleasures and needs of his own body seemed the target of destroying a man who seemed so similar to himself. If he could find it in himself to truly grow curious about Emiya, he could destroy the one desire he had ever come to have.

That seemed powerful to him. The grail’s prospect of wishes was far away from his reality of flesh and people and himself. If he had come to yearn for change in his life, he would already have become a prisoner to desire and that was simply a black nothingness to him. Kotomine longed for nothing.

Tokiomi did not necessarily interest him. He found himself distantly listening and following along but never truly accepting Tokiomi’s idealisms. Naturally his working alongside the man proved beneficial and thus he even allowed himself to be used as a pawn but that was all in speculation of the gains. They saw things differently. Simply put, he did not acknowledge Tokiomi’s view on life. He did not care. Tokiomi was not Emiya and Emiya had yet to be properly analyzed.

But it all changed when he met _that_ man. The blatant gluttony and greed that was openly displayed caught Kotomine off guard. Maybe he had spent a few too many days watching the constricted and controlled mannerisms Tokiomi prided himself on. His eyes followed along the numerous bottles of emptied wine scattered throughout the room, leading to the lounging figure of a man clad in gold jewelry. How extravagant, Kotomine had thought blandly, unimpressed for only a moment before they met gazes. Those sharp red eyes pierced him to the very core. This was the servant of the man he found so typical. And he smiled at Kotomine, wine glass rising to beautiful lips.

It was not as if this was the first time Kotomine had acknowledged beauty in person’s form. He knew beauty but it was the first time it had struck him so deeply. He felt rattled to see such delicate pretty features contrasted with powerful, unyielding eyes and confidence. The line of his eyebrow arched as if appraising his staring and in the light his blond hair felt somehow all the more striking. It gave the servant a youthful glow, a strange innocence Kotomine knew he didn’t have. Archer… honest to emotion and outstandingly powerful, especially to one so caught in the fickleness of his own pride.

This was a king. A king of kings. The King of Heroes. Laying along the couch, his slender limbs showed an out of place vulnerability that made Kotomine’s neck flush with a heat he had never known. His expression remained stoic, calm but now he could not stop himself from drinking Archer’s presence in, his words, the deeply human angles of his body, the youth of his appearance that juxtaposed his centuries of experience. As Archer satiated himself on Kotomine’s wine, Kotomine filled himself with the presence of the contradictory, handsome king who served a man who had no control over him. Listening to Archer calmly insult his own master, (a master over a king of kings…?) made Kotomine’s heart rate pick up. The king of pleasure found no pleasure in Tokiomi’s hand but those devilish red eyes had fallen on him. They burned into him, interested, anticipating.

Strangely, he laid before Kotomine like a God. Not any God, but _his_ God. For all these years he had falsely prostrated himself before a God who meant nothing to him and had given his physical flesh to the black coat of the church. But now as he sat beneath the floors of the very building that should have defined him, inside him was a blossoming awareness. The all-powerful nature of Archer’s being contained in his beautiful, flawless but weak and physical human form was unbelievably attractive and had a wonderful swelling of heat pooling in Kotomine’s stomach. If he could conquer the king of pleasures, was not that the highest form of pleasure he could obtain and thus indulge himself in?

How he had been searching for something so far away from his truth. Now he understood. He had to possess God and dominate him. He had to have Tokiomi’s servant, body and soul. If he conquered the God of pleasure, one who had tasted every amusement possible, then he would be tasting the ripest fruit. His own apple of Eden. Archer was truly the finest being- he took form for Kotomine to see, touch, grab, and yet he contained unbelievable potential spiritually, his mana at the highest quality. The personality of his king was one with flaw; anger, pride and fickle temperament that was presented in such a form that there was nothing that contained him like the strange defective perception of elegance. For his honesty was the truest elegance. He was naturally graceful and despite Kotomine’s usual lack of arousal, he found himself aching to pin the man down and take him like he would a woman. He wanted to dominate the God of domination in the most human manners possible. He longed to see himself above a God in his own rotting flesh of a prison.

It was the first time he had come to a conclusion that did not need bloodshed of his target. Naturally there was fear that came with this revelation. There was denial to some aspects, especially when it came to the prospect of how deeply Archer had pierced him. Those all-seeing devil eyes could burn straight to his most secret truths. Even those he didn’t know himself. He wanted to deny his longing to see agony twist between those blond eyebrows. If he succumbed to this feeling, it would be the finest acceptance of sin. Kotomine would become a blemish on the church he was pressured to cradle.

Thus there was obvious conflict. He yearned to grab the ankles of that golden man and yank him to the filthy dirt and claim him. Kotomine was dirty anyway, dirty because he was full of denial and cold, brittle lies but he… he didn’t want to be such a terrible man. Naturally, the socialization caught him. There was never supposed to be pleasure gained from another’s suffering.

Archer laughed sweetly at that. The crumbling, hollow logics of the church rocked Kotomine’s footing more than he thought it could. He could and would come to accept how his eyes hungered for the suffering of others. The wine tasted better with the cries of despair and he knew, a slow churning sensation in his stomach, that the greatest wine was blond, perceptive and head strong. This was all slow building, rushing through his blood in a strange imitation of adrenaline. But how it felt to throw away pieces of his persona… tearing from his own flesh, and devouring the worthless hunks of his own grown meat and soul soothed his hunger and pained him in ways that he couldn’t explain.

When he looked into Archer’s smiling features, it was as if he had finally come close to someone. His father had never come to the edge to look down into the abyss that was Kotomine Kirei’s heart and acknowledge it for the deep crater of longing, black hunger and solitude that it was. No man had stared down into Kotomine’s soul and smiled like Archer had. He had smiled and then praised the infinite depth to his darkness, opening up Kotomine’s ribs with his very hands smearing blood across both their bodies, warming the cold limbs Kotomine had always struggled to motivate. He had reached in and just kept reaching.

And finally he knew this was a real God. Heaven and Hell were just simply a concoction of the realm just above the physical mixed together so thoroughly they were indistinguishable and it had sent him his savior, his partner, his awakening.

They drank wine together, binding each other’s fates to one another with fondness on their bated breath. Together, there was budding promise of everything Kotomine hadn’t known he needed. And he needed Archer. He needed him more and more, the lingering ever-present company of the king buried itself deep into Kotomine’s consciousness and became a foundation for something he had never had. Attachment.

Archer was never one to overstay before Kotomine’s examining gaze and he, whether out of the playful sense of superiority or the fondness of watching Kotomine puzzle through problems, never over stepped his set boundaries for giving Kotomine information. Maybe it was because he respected Kotomine’s speed for development, progression… evolution. Maybe it was a beautiful mix of all three and Archer was a complicated relic in mind who loved more openly than his attitude presented.

Kotomine’s relationship with Archer was so much grander than his with Assassin. This was a conclusion that lacked the analysis he put into others he found himself drawn to but in the scheme of his relationship of servant and master, it was a bold change. This bond was no longer merely tool and user, but something Kotomine was fully, wholly invested in. He wanted to mark the king who had taken the entire world as his garden with his fluids and grow devil vines to grab hold; he wanted to claim the king at the most carnal levels and paint him with his own semen and blood so he could, as the mortal man, never be forgotten or erased by the immortal king he had taken from heaven. 

The more he accepted the tar that lined his veins, the more he was able to breathe and observe with attentiveness. He could almost even call it love when it came to Gilgamesh. Naturally, his perception on love was lacking as up until this point he had found nothing beneficial about the emotion, but now he thought, he could embrace it. 

The destruction, the devastation of the hell hole that was the grail, burning away everyone, even Emiya, began it all truly for him. The city’s buildings crumbled as if made of sand, fire and anguish ripping apart the concrete and cement that had once made Fuyuki. Humans bodies were scattered, blood splattered across ground that wasn’t burning as if marking it with one final wail of despair. All of the golden armor that had once protected Gilgamesh’s body was stripped down and burned away as they had their rebirth together under the black bitter curses and spittle of the demon cup. He looked upon the naked flesh of the man who was connected to his very soul and felt within him rise a great roar of laughter and delight. Gilgamesh no longer had any barriers; he had truly dragged him down into his very hands. All he had had to do was die and be reborn. If nothing spoke to greater levels of his devotion, then it was this. 

Hell was what he had wished for. Even the suffering of the grail itself was a pleasant sip of metaphorical wine to him and as he passed the red cloth to cover his servant’s body, he knew this forward would finally be his climb to God conquering. He had conquered death.

He looked upon the ruins of Fuyuki and felt all the emotions he had never experienced truly in his years up until this point swell in his chest. It was an incomparable experience. Kotomine’s eyes passed along the broken form of Emiya Kiritsugu limping through the wreckage and for a brief moment he fell into old thoughts. If he had just one more battle with… But no, Emiya was not his savior. The eyes that saw right through him were weak, desperate… They were sad. He was his own savior. Gilgamesh called to him and he realized, he had already defeated Emiya. With the fires tormenting Fuyuki he wanted to burn away his lingering ideas of similarity to the crying man searching for life.

He did not know it, but they would have years together now- him and his God of flesh and agony. He did not know that he had properly claimed Gilgamesh for his own. It would come to him as confidence crawled into his rotting heart where his love and affection for the king smoldered eerily like burning maggots, infesting him with patience and strength. His mind had matured and with acceptance of his lust for despair, he slid his pectoral cross back on and he buried Tokiomi’s body.

What a laugh.

Upon looking at the shattered, bleeding persona of Rin’s mother did he feel himself settle on his throne of bodies sweetly. Kotomine would allow this pain to fester more. He would twist himself into the best position for agony. Returning home, he walked slowly. He no longer felt any need to rush.

Gilgamesh awaited him, sitting pleasantly in one of the chairs in the basement, eyes flickering to him knowingly. He could see into Kotomine’s good mood and that also pleased the man. He liked being seen through and accepted by his closest companion.

Tipping his wine glass towards Kotomine, he asked in that sultry voice marked by his age, “The funeral went well, I see?” His eyes followed slowly but accurately along Kotomine’s form as he moved across the room and to his usual chair.

Resting his chin along his hand, Kotomine replied, “It was a moving experience.” He couldn’t refrain from his lips curling into a cocked grin from between his fingers as the images flashed behind his eyes of Tokiomi’s withering existence being literally covered up with dirt, forever sealing him into a mere hollow, ever fading memory of his former self accentuated perfectly by the pained expressions of his daughter. “I’m feeling rather.. celebratory.”

Gilgamesh hummed, head rolling back and eyes ever pressing against Kotomine. “A glass of wine in toast sounds appropriate.” His bracelets jingled as he moved in preparation and collected a glass for Kotomine, grabbing the already opened wine bottle from the table. Kotomine admired the view of the King of Heroes pouring _him_ a glass of wine, and felt a wonderful hunger swell up inside him. The filled glass was passed to him nicely, delicate looking between the servant’s fingers and all the more appealing.

“Thank you.” Kotomine took hold of the glass and together they leaned towards one another for a toast.

“To your everlasting victory, Kotomine.” Gilgamesh smiled over the rim of his glass, “And to future ones.”

“To a partnership more valuable than words can describe.” Kotomine returned honestly, eyes focused on the shifting along his servant’s throat as he swallowed and how utterly mortal the action was. It was a brief second before he himself took a drank, savoring the boldness against his tongue that only fueled the warmth spreading through him as it traveled down to his stomach.

It felt good to be honest to oneself, Kotomine thought, watching through hooded eyes at the lazy swirling red of his servant’s cup and his unfazed expression. It felt like he had finally grasped life for the first time in all of his years on this forsaken planet. What a cruel joke it was to play on the church’s God- to die a sinner and come back holding things more precious than prayer itself. To die a sinner and return an even greater sinner.

Oh, how he had gained a sense of humor since beginning and winning this game.

“What will you do now, Kotomine?”

His name. His eyes opened slowly, the headiness of the wine and the weight of his thoughts holding him in his mind. Gilgamesh would not call him as ‘master.’ Nor would he impose the rule on the servant he cheated from the game to do so. No. He liked it this way. He liked their faux concern to put each other on equal terms. Looking Gilgamesh in the eyes he knew that this was their power play; neither wanted to simply attempt to physically crush the other, but force him to bend, to slip up into the throne with the only weapon between them being sharp, cutting words and a slow working manipulation. Despite his hot headed pretense, Gilgamesh could show patience. But Kotomine knew this. He knew this was their love.

Little did the king of kings, the king of everything, know though, Kotomine had just discovered what it meant to desire something and it burned him more than any molten demon cup could. He wanted this more than anything his now not so fragile human consciousness could imagine and he had had to fight to get here. So Kotomine could put his whole being to this cause, this fucking game.

He could give everything away.

“We’ll wait.” He hummed, sitting back, “We’ll wait tens of years if we have to. Everything will come back around.”

We’ll wait around for fate to worm its nasty little broken body between the carcasses feeding the grounds of Fuyuki and curse this very land to repeat the same game so they could all meet again to slaughter each other for a demon. And while they waited, he and his lovely, golden servant would play.

And Kotomine would win.

Xxx

The years were peaceful and generous to the mind. Kotomine became the head priest of the church not only in image but in his manipulation. A place for those to rest when they became weary was the perfect place to plant seeds. He devoted himself to that cause. Plus, he liked seeing Gilgamesh, in all his beauty and his sins, to come walking through the pews casually, like a demon who was unperturbed by the power of faith and holiness. An ageless demon who came and went as he pleased.

Was this a pretty little fantasy of his? Maybe. Maybe Kotomine would never truly escape his upbringing. But it held truth. Gilgamesh laughed in the face of Christianity because he was closer to power than any pathetic dream crafted by scared humans. But humans controlled reality and by humans Gilgamesh knew strength and so it all came around to Kotomine. Was he infinite? No. But was it by his hand that Gilgamesh knew the light of day and knew infinity. Humans’ faith created infinity on this plane. He longed both to see the free and confident stride of his demonic, God-like partner, and to push him into the confines of his own love and devotion like the Christians did with their God in their Bible. He wanted to confine that contradictory golden man and skewer him to his very bones so that they could never be apart.

Since the cup’s game had ended years past, their contract as servant and master had warped. No longer was Gilgamesh an extension of Kotomine, one to appear as a mirage of magic and a shield to protect fragile limbs with. He walked on his own. No longer did he don shimmering armor or push his hair up in a crown-like fashion. Blending in as well as he could in modern Japan, he adorned himself in the current fashion as approved by Kotomine’s off-handed comments. He had calmed greatly over the years and had aged in attitude like a fine wine. Kotomine had known this of him. He had enjoyed aging him.

As he had said years earlier, he was going to win their game. So this was only added bonus. Time wasn’t exactly linear for them, except in the way his body developed so there wasn’t any restriction on his mind, on his soul. He could surpass a pretty little boy who had had a universe bend to him. Think of the time Gilgamesh felt he had. Kotomine’s body didn’t know those kinds of unfathomable lacks of restraints. He had to be a little more punctual. For fuck’s sake, he was going to rot.

But whether Gilgamesh played into it all, or didn’t mind was something Kotomine wasn’t able to decipher. Maybe after it all was said and done, he was simply a limitless God anyway and had time to play along with one pathetic little human. Like Kotomine knew, time wasn’t necessarily always linear. He would only know when he won the game.

Although in some ways, he had already made Gilgamesh his own. Through mingling conversation over drink he had found that no other besides himself had ever made it to such a result in the Fate games. No mere human had, with such little magical potential, overcome the cursed tar that burned even bones to nothing and still clung not only to life but his very servant’s life as well. There was pride in Gilgamesh’s voice.

Pride as a servant, pride as a master. Soon Kotomine would soon show the distinction.

If he was going to make history, he might as well be a little selfish about it as well.

Kotomine didn’t know when but soon there would be a new heir to the Kiritsugu name. Thoroughly, he would relish the game with a boy basically born from fire and devastation and because his adopted father had only disappointed, Shirou would be the one to take the weight of his father’s failures. He wasn’t going to play soft this time.

Naturally, he relished the time with his servant alone. Even if he was waiting, anticipating the return of the grail, he would never actively give any of his time with his servant up simply to know the cup had returned. And Gilgamesh himself seemed to linger more and more as the years passed in Kotomine’s presence. Every year his favor for flashy clothes lessened and in place he lengthened conversation with the aging priest. When the wine ran low, he returned with stock. Maybe because of this plane of reality, Gilgamesh felt Kotomine was the only one who understood the complicated reasonings for his presence in modern Japan. Maybe he yearned for company who knew of his past.

Maybe he didn’t.

What the hell did Kotomine know of a God’s mind? He knew nothing and everything of Gilgamesh. Years of being together had taught him of a complicated, intelligent man of strategy and law and then lack of time outside of his mortal life had shown him that with centuries upon centuries, there welled emotions so potent he was sure it could bring him to end his very small existence simply by peering too long into their waters. But he didn’t mind being small. Even this small, he could break a God’s will. Had the shame followed him from his past? Shame that he was so shameless? Not this year. 

This year he saw himself holding a God down by his throat and breathing in the very gasps that proved he and God both had limits on this plane. His ability to be patient had long improved since they had met and while he had accepted he would never know the lengths of Gilgamesh’s years, he would know a Gilgamesh born here in Japan that he had helped mold. He had _patiently_ fostered himself and this relationship. 

When he called, Gilgamesh would come. When he returned home, Gilgamesh would be waiting. They were chained together by fate and with that chain, Kotomine would strangle Gilgamesh within an inch of his life. 

How his guts longed to see that agonizing pinch on that beautiful face. Truly whether he had been born into this chaos of a universe for no reason at all or to create opportunities for suffering, he didn’t care. With both these hands, Kotomine would cling to his own reasons to live and Gilgamesh was one held tightly in his right hand. 

“Do you feel the cup’s presence returning?” Gilgamesh lounged comfortably, like a cat in the sun, on the first pew’s bench. Between his fingers, he rolled a coin up and down his knuckles. 

Standing at the lectern, Kotomine’s eyes lifted slowly from his Bible to look along his pretty little God’s exposed throat and socks peeking out from between his pants and his shoes. He let his gaze fall back into the pages, “It’s a slow trickle of mana moving, but yes.” 

“Despite everything, Tokiomi’s daughter will probably participate.” Gilgamesh’s eyes narrowed, his expression sharpening, “Or rather, because of everything.” 

A loose smile found Kotomine’s lips. He turned a page, “Well, the Tokiomi family has always cherished loyalty and tradition. If the father is to die in battle, it would only be appropriate for the child to follow suite.” 

The coin came whirling to his face, slapping with a noise into his palm. Lowering his hand back down with the five hundred yen coin still sitting inside, Kotomine looked to Gilgamesh who was now standing, hands in his pockets. Like a cat, truly always on guard. Like a child, playing games, he was amused with either winning or losing as long as he got a reaction. (Like a lover, never leaving his side.)

“You’re quite terrible. Acting so detached when you are completely involved.” The servant commented offhandedly, walking up onto the stage with one fluid movement, to slip closer and closer to his contractor, “Your reflexes are getting better despite your age.” 

Kotomine felt the warmth of a God’s body against his clothes. Heat like a child. 

Pulling forward Gilgamesh’s hand, he turned it palm up and placed the coin gently back into the other’s hand, “I’m not an old man yet. By any logic, you would be too old to be playing such tricks.” 

Gilgamesh leaned back against the lecturn, hand slipping back into his pocket. They stood together in silence, only the sound of the turning pages rippling into the air. The air was cool with the stone walls but the light of the dwindling sun filtered in to burn along the floor. It was a long few moments of stillness before Gilgamesh talked once more. 

“Do you miss Kiritsugu?”

Flippantly, “Not at all. There will be plenty of new players. He was only the most interesting in the last game.” Kotomine responded. 

Gilgamesh’s dark eyelashes lowered in thought. 

“Are you feeling nostalgic, Gilgamesh, now that you can sense the cup?”

A light chuckle slipped between pretty lips, “Maybe so.” 

“It’s almost been ten years.” Kotomine closed the book with a resounding clap that echoed up into the open air of the ceiling, “It’s been too long and not long enough. The cup is quite impatient.” He turned to the other, giving him a slight smile. 

Gilgamesh returned it in silence. A silence that proved his common view. 

“Now, shall we drink to this turn of events?” Kotomine walked from the stage. His body moved with a deliberate slowness, like he had all the time in the world and had known not even one moment of uncertainty. With his hands folded behind his back, he turned in the doorway to Gilgamesh, “We should be expecting to get quite busy soon. There will be little time to spend doing whatever we please.”

For a moment, they looked between one another. A power game. Maybe in the past, Kotomine would have faltered under the intensity of the King’s gaze but now he relished the attention. How he looked reflected in that deep, enchanting red was quite pleasing. The seconds passed. His servant hopped from the stairs, “You are quite right.” 

Kotomine’s smile grew, a bold expression as he turned away. How he loved the aging of a fine wine. “I have just the bottle for this occasion. I saved it about ten years ago actually, around the time of Tokiomi’s passing, just for this moment.” 

Gilgamesh hummed from behind him on the stairs, “How diligent of you.” Once again, he could hear appreciation in the man’s voice. Gilgamesh did love tradition in means of respect and ceremony. Some things never changed. 

Tonight is the night, Kotomine thought, bending to get into the farthest reach of the wine cupboard. Gripping the bottle’s neck, he turned to the servant sitting on the couch watching him. How arrogant and typical that he, as a human, wanted to claim something far bigger and more powerful than himself in his dirty little hands.

But if he could do it, he might as well. 

Gilgamesh drank the wine with a tender flush at the second bottle. He lowered his glass in one slow fluid movement and rested back onto the couch. Kotomine watched from behind one hand in his own chair. While he could definitely continue drinking, his glass was still relatively full. 

He smiled. “Are you feeling warm already, Gilgamesh? Have these ten measly years weakened your tolerance?” 

Despite it all, the sharpness of those blood red eyes remained the same. They flickered open and found Kotomine easily, “Maybe. My form has taken to mimicking a mere mortal’s.” He gently let his eyes fall closed, “My mana has become limited without the grail. I rarely use large bouts of magic as well. It makes this body feel weak.” With one final, heavy sigh, he rested down onto the couch, voice taking on a mock dramatic tone, “How unfortunate that this kind of side effect has come about from all this.” 

Kotomine hummed, swirling his glass, “It’s not that all bad, is it? You can finally feel your liquor.” He joked, sipping from his own glass. He knew that the mana transfer bond between master and servant was established in order to participate in the game and that merely due to the circumstances of his own will and their actions towards the cup did Gilgamesh keep his form in this realm. Gilgamesh’s consumption of mana to perform at his peak was heavy and without the contract between them and the grail, it was impossible to impose such levels of mana to him. 

This was fine with Kotomine. A weakened King was easier to overthrow. 

“I suppose.”

Taking another sip for good measure, Kotomine replied, “Once you reenter the contract officially, your mana will most likely be fully restored.” He stood, placing the glass on the table. 

He came to the couch’s side, standing above the golden God he loved and cherished and wanted to devour. Gilgamesh looked up along the dark angles of his priest and gave a crooked smile as he watched Kotomine bend down and place a hand next to him on the couch, “Well, well…” He murmured gently into the other’s lips, slipping back down as Kotomine pinned one of his hands above his head for good measure. 

“How unbecoming of us..” The servant whispered, gazing up into Kotomine’s dark eyes. 

“There’s nothing unbecoming of you.” 

“You flatter me.” 

Kotomine’s dark eyebrow raised slightly, “You’re being quite playful.” 

Gilgamesh’s expression hardened, closing up. He didn’t pull his hand away, not because he couldn’t but because he could at any point. “I told myself I would never come under such weak emotions again.” 

“Because you fear loss?”

The servant’s free hand moved up, settling heavily on Kotomine’s chest as a warning. “Presumptuous remarks aren’t appreciated even if I am a little drunk.” 

Kotomine’s eyelids lowered slowly but he merely stared down at the tightness pulled along Gilgamesh’s expression. Although he couldn’t call this moment tender, he could see the brittle defenses keeping him at bay and found a vast welling of affection (if he could even call it such) growing inside of him. How utterly mortal and vulnerable his God was. How beautiful. 

Gilgamesh lowered his gaze, the fierceness of his palm fading into simply a touch. “You too will one day die and leave me.” His words were soft between them but not without their own sad, quiet kind of strength.

“But today I am here.”

“How arrogant for you to say that when we both know I will most certainly outlive you.” 

Dipping down to touch along Gilgamesh’s neck, the hand he was using to pin down the servant’s hand increased its pressure with his own body weight as he slipped his fingers around the throat of his decade long partner. 

“Then would you like to experience what it’s like to die under the gaze of one who loves you?”

There was a pause between them. 

A twinge of interest played in Gilgamesh’s tone. “You plan to kill me?” 

“I plan to get as close as possible and then revive you.” His thumb caressed the tender flesh between the jaw and the jugular like a kiss. 

Gilgamesh’s eyes narrowed, shimmering as if they were pools of blood, “Like your Christian stories.” 

Kotomine’s grip tightened, his grin widening, “There are similarities. Revival is a very powerful theme in this religion. And I’ve already been reborn once for this relationship.” He leaned down, voice becoming harsh but private between them, “As we are, by my own hand, a revival would suit you wonderfully.” 

Gilgamesh’s eyes were moving slightly behind soft, long eyelashes and he murmured back, “How utterly despicable of you.” 

Kotomine released him, rising back from the couch, the smile still lingering on his lips. He moved back around the table to his seat, slipping into it elegantly. Lifting his wine glass back from the wood, he looked to Gilgamesh, gaze dark, “How cold. Look at you, acting so detached when you are so completely involved.” 

Gilgamesh rose slowly from the couch, his eyes never leaving Kotomine’s. He stared at the priest as he stood before the cushions he usually lounged freely on. They played with power even when they were both completely serious. Kotomine shifted his legs further open a fraction as he rested back comfortably in his chair. 

“Well, why don’t you come here.” 

Another moment between them. Gilgamesh’s silence was simply exquisite. 

He seemed to have sobered and while it was frequent for him to show his emotions openly, the darkening of his expression seemed to show a fierce anger. His head lowered slightly and he gave Kotomine another hard appraisal before coming forward to stand right before the man. One hand gripped the arm rest while he came to sit upon Kotomine’s lap. It was the most contact they had had in all of their ten years (but this was not to be said of everything but their physical bodies.)

Gilgamesh leaned slowly into Kotomine’s face, not only coiling a hot, molten heat in the man’s lower stomach but also angling his smile minimally with the most wonderful of amusements.

“You play your cards well, Kotomine.” 

“I didn’t join all these games all these years for some pathetic little wish, you know.”

Gilgamesh’s eyes narrowed a fraction. 

“We are both mortal on this plane so there is nothing wrong with breaking your rule while you are away from your own reality.”

“I am no mortal.”

Kotomine’s voice lowered as he ghosted his hand across the high cheek bone of his truest friend, “You grieve like you are.” 

This silenced the King once again, his expression unreadable and heavy. But he allowed Kotomine’s gentle touching, resting his body weight fully in the priest’s lap. He was heavy with muscle and power. Maybe he was realizing Kotomine knew him well or maybe he was lost in past memories that clung to his heart. Softly he moved forward, touching his forehead to Kotomine’s where the man could then feel the gentle tickle of blond hair. 

“Your eyes look nothing the same to the gaze I have experienced before.” 

Kotomine smiled, “I think you find them pleasing enough.” 

A slight purse of lips, “...You used to be so weak.”

Angling his head upwards, they brushed lips as Kotomine whispered back, “Now who has aged during these ten years?”

Against his own dark sheets, he wrapped his fingers around a delicate throat and gave his virginity to a sin. They had both been present in the preparations of Gilgamesh’s body which Kotomine greatly enjoyed. In the steaming mirror, he watched the pinching of pain and abnormality twist Gilgamesh’s pretty eyebrows and flush his cheeks and under his own strain and the heat of water and touch a fine sweat had caused his hair to cling sweetly to his face. 

Kotomine had asked whether Gilgamesh found his human-like body troublesome and the blond man had merely laughed at him, giving him quite a look and, dragging Kotomine closer by a strong grip on the back of his head, kissed him harshly. His fierceness showed nothing but power and arousal to which Kotomine welcomed greatly. Even the scrape of teeth along both of their mouths was so thick in his gut that he had a hand around Gilgamesh’s throat on the bathroom floor without another thought.

They then moved it to the bedroom. 

Gilgamesh had pushed off Kotomine’s clothes, his strength pulling at the fabric and rubbing the priest’s skin raw. He seemed to pay no mind to being below Kotomine and without shame demanded his own pleasure, gripping along flesh with hot fingers. 

Naked and aching and looking deeper and deeper into the living form of a God he had held in his palms for ten years now, Kotomine could barely contain himself. Not that he needed to hold himself back, Gilgamesh was insatiable.

Panting under the pressure of Kotomine’s cock in his guts, Gilgamesh demanded, “Harder.. Harder, Kotomine..”

The scrape of fingernails lined his back as he gave a cocked smile, the sweat clinging to his jaw as it ran down his face, “Of course.” He knew the weight of his body gave a sweet pang up the servant’s spine and used it to his advantage as he moved against him. 

His hands were along the man’s throat not long after that and the grin that broke across Gilgamesh’s face proved their likeness. He didn’t struggle and Kotomine didn’t want him to. They kissed and the priest felt the soft whispers of a final breath against his lips which pleased him immensely. Gilgamesh’s reddened cheeks and his tightening organs were only the finest of pleasures Kotomine could fathom.

Finally all the brittle blackness that felt like a endless pit of darkness in his soul came rushing out, as if it had melted in their heat and he could sense that there was change. A reaction between them and upon pushing the sweaty bangs from Gilgamesh’s forehead, he looked down on everything that had made him who he was and smiled softly in their own afterglow.

Both men looked up into what would be a partnership of abnormality with the new grail and its new players. They did not know what would come of the new game, but Kotomine welcomed it. His own game was in its last round and honestly with all the chaos he had pushed into the universe, he was well prepared for his own suffering. 

He could find himself perishing within the game for the sake of disorder and to that he kissed Gilgamesh sweetly, lingering on the taste of sweat and mana.


End file.
